1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to vehicle armor for protection from explosive devices. Further, the present invention relates to an armor system that protects vehicle occupants from land mines and improvised explosive devices.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Typically, vehicle armor is used on military motor vehicles, such as a High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle (HMMWV or Humvee). The U.S. Department of Defense defines three levels of protection for Humvees. Level-one protection describes a Humvee that comes directly from its manufacturing facility “up-armored” with bullet-proof glass and armor on the sides, front, rear, top, and bottom. Level-two protection is achieved by “add-on” armor kits that are fitted to existing Humvees that were originally unarmored or “soft-skinned.” However, these kits only provide front, rear, side, and glass protection, while leaving the top and the bottom of the vehicle vulnerable. Level-three armor refers to the use of steel plates that are welded or bolted onto an unarmored Humvee and provides the least amount of protection to its occupants. Even when equipped with level-one protection, however, most up-armored Humvees offer little protection against blasts from below and only sufficiently protect against lateral attacks.
Originally designed for personnel and light cargo transport, the basic Humvee has no armor or protection. To provide a defense against ballistic weapons and more specifically, land mines and improvised explosive devices, prior art devices commonly use various armor designs (see, e.g., U.S. Pat. No. 6,658,984; U.S. Published Patent Application No. 2003/0010189; U.S. Published Patent Application No. 2006/0201319; U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,663,520; 4,326,445; 7,114,764; U.S. Published Patent Application No. 2006/0048641) and reactive elements (see, e.g., U.S. Published Patent Application No. 2007/0017361; U.S. Pat. No. 6,345,563; U.S. Published Patent Application No. 2006/0086243) to achieve the aforementioned levels of protection.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,658,984 and U.S. Published Patent Application No. 2003/0010189 describe an apparatus for providing anti-mine protection for an armored vehicle comprising a concave floor plate mounted to the outer hull of a vehicle. Similarly, U.S. Patent Application No. 2006/0201319 describes a “convex-shaped” protection apparatus attached underneath a vehicle that is capable of resisting a force applied to it. These documents, however, describe protection systems that only use a form of hard armor. They do not use any kind of reactive devices or deformable membranes to further protect vehicle occupants.
On the other hand, U.S. Patent Application No. 2007/0017361 describes an active armor system having two layers, where if the outer layer is attacked by projectile, one or more shaped charges are detonated in the opposite direction to degrade the effectiveness of the projectile. This system can be used on a lightly armored vehicle or retrofitted onto an unarmored vehicle. Likewise, U.S. Pat. No. 6,345,563 describes a reactive armor system that contains armor plates with wells. Within each well, several holes hide explosive pills. When one pill is detonated by a projectile, several pills around it are also detonated by means of an explosive sheet. This armor system can be used for the bottom of a tank for protection against armor-piercing land mines. However, while these protection systems use reactive elements and outer shields, they do not use an additional deformable membrane layer in between the two components.
Though all of these devices use armor, reactive explosive devices, or a combination of both, none of the aforementioned documents combine armor, a deformable membrane, and reactive blocks to protect the vehicle's occupants from land mines or improvised explosive devices. To minimize the danger to a vehicle's occupants, the protection system should not only provide an armor shield and reactive elements, but it should utilize a deformable membrane in between the armor and reactive elements to trap residual explosive elements.
Thus, there remains a need for a vehicle armor system that adequately protects occupants from land mines and improvised explosive devices.